Debunking the myth that "DS is now useless"
Link to the wiki page in case you want to read its current description: https://deadbydaylight.fandom.com/wiki/Decisive_Strike
The DS nerf basically consists of a series of actions that will deactivate the perk until you get unhooked again.
In this post, I'll go through every action that deactivates the perk, and why it doesn't affect the true purpose of using this perk: making the killer waste a lot of time, pressure and gens in case they decide to tunnel you.
I'll start with the easy/obvious points, and continue with the not so obvious ones.
- Cleansing a Totem: my dude, if you are doing bones you clearly aren't being tunnelled.
- Sabotaging a Hook: there are 2 scenarios, either you are randomly saboing hooks which makes no sense, or you are trying to save a teammate who is about to be hooked. In the latter scenario, you are not being tunnelled because in fact, the killer chased another survivor. You don't need DS.
- Repairing a Generator: 2 scenarios here again, either you are gen tapping which makes no sense during a chase, plus this mechanic shouldn't even be allowed in the game, or you are chilling sitting on a gen. If you have time to repair a gen, you are not being tunnelled.
- Healing yourself: if you have time to be self-caring, you aren't being tunnelled because the killer would have simply downed you.
- Healing other survivors: same as above.
- Unhooking other Survivors: this situation is kinda tricky, however usually means the killer chased another survivor, hooked him, and you are going for the save. Hence, the killer didn't chase you for a long time so you weren't being tunneled.
Overall this nerf has been a pretty healthy one for the game, and the perk is still useful against tunnelling.
If the killer, however, decides to keep chasing you after you DSed them, they'll lose a huge amount of time and pressure. DS worked.
You could sum up DS nerf as:
If you are able to make progress in the game, you are not being tunnelled, hence no need for DS.
Comments
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Not to mention it's still a strong endgame perk. If you were the last one on the hook, and your rescuer was at full health, it's a free escape most times. That aspect hasn't changed. It also means that your farm proof.
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I agree with the nerf, it removes the loopholes survivors can use to progress the game while being invincible. Now, survivors are only invincible when they aren't progressing the game and are being tunneled.
However, with that said, I wished DS could be buffed to activate on every hook, regardless if you already used it previously. 😅
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12 invincibility minutes is way too much, doesn't matter if you are progressing the game or not.
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Yeah I really don't know where people get the whole "DS is useless" thing from. Maybe it's because they relied on a perk to win rather than skill, but idk.
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Yeah I really don't know where people get the whole "DS is useless" thing from.
Because it gave them a full minute god shield, and they started using this perk offensively instead of deffensively.
When they started doing this, specially SWFs, games were pretty much unwinnable.
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You say that as if anything in this game takes skill.
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There's a huge difference between newbies and experienced players.
This fact means that indeed skill is needed to improve.
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DS is one of those perks that can either be super OP or super useless. I feel like every perk needs to have an effect that justifies bringing it over other useful perks. That being said, I think the new nerf to DS is justifiable if it were to activate every time you're unhooked. Otherwise, it seems kind of underwhelming. And I mean, I say that, but my opinion means very little because I don't use DS, I know killers dislike it, and the whole 3 times I ran it, I missed the skill check every time. I can hit every overcharge and oppression skill check, but I guess the performance anxiety gets to me, and I completely fudge it.
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It CAN'T be 12 minutes, survivors die on upon their third hook state. It's actually 8 minutes, but even then, don't expect survivors to stay invincible for that long because they have to make progress or else 8 minutes will give the killer too much time if they decide to NOT tunnel. 😅
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It still works with Unbreakable, so you have to respect that Decisive.
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But I can't be invincible for 60 seconds anymore, it's complete garbage.
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I like current DS a lot actually but there’s just two things I would change about it
- Remove the skill check. This was added when DS was a “hard” get out of jail free card. For the sake of new players who have to deal with tunnelling they might as well make it automatic
- Let it be used on both hooks stages regardless of if you used it before. If the killer is hard tunnelling that one survivor why shouldn’t they be DSed twice?
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12 minutes of them doing literally, absolutely nothing? My guy that's a legitimate free win.
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Problem solved.
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This 100000000000%.
You can be tunneled twice, from both hook stages, so how is it good a preventing tunneling when it only works for half of it? Should activate every time you get unhooked.
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Being healed by OTHERS doesn't deactivate DS, it should be fixed ASAP!
It should also include killer specific powers:
DS should deactiavte if:
- You disarm a trap
- You use your flashlight (to destroy hag trap)
- Cleanse yourself from the Plague
- Search a Jigsaw box
- etc.
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Looks good to me
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It's good to prevent tunneling since wasting you time to down 1 person, hook them, get DSed, down them, and hook them again, it's way too much.
In that process minimum 2-3 gens have popped. If that happens you basically lost.
Not to mention that if the survivor is good a looping he might waste your time even more.
Nowadays if you decide to tunnel 1 survivor until he's dead from the start of the game, 3 survivors are gonna escape. 4 might escape if this survivor was good at looping.
With the current state of DS is more than enough to discourage tunneling.
If you ever want to rank up, you certainly won't do so by tunneling.
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That's true tho! They didn't take into account other actions that progress the game but are due to killer powers...
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True, 8 minutes, my bad.
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Given how good the DS nerf was, I'd be completely fine with DS having two charges per game, or basically being used after each unhook. At least then the killer will know that survivor has DS if they used it after 1 hook, and can then avoid tunnelling them after their 2nd.
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I'd have to disagree with this. For the first two, even with DS up, a survivor shouldn't aim to lose a chase as fast as possible, actions that could be performed in chase with the intent of extending said chase, should not deactivate DS.
Cleansing against plague may heal the survivor however it gives the killer an extremely deadly ability in return that can down multiple survivors in a small window of time.
Searching a jigsaw box deactivating DS is pretty counterintuitive, DS is designed so that it deactivates when a survivor progresses the game, but traps are also designed to shift a survivor's focus away from objectives. An active trap is a survivor's main priority when playing against Pig as it can kill them in a matter of minutes, making one of the only anti-tunnel perks in the game deactivate for doing the only thing that a survivor can do in that situation wouldn't make sense.
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Searching a jigsaw box should definitely not disarm DS. You need to search boxes even when in danger of being found, or you die either way. Plus in my experience Pigs are one of the biggest tunnellers, despite their traps doing the job for them, it's like they want the watch your head pop off.
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Just need to look at the comments during the last time DS was nerfed.
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Before:
Killer: "I got DS'd and I didn't tunnel."
Survivors: "No you must have if you got hit with DS, don't tunnel and no problem."
Now:
Survivor: "I got tunneled"
Killer: "Run DS then, it still hits them if they tunnel and it's still strong."
Survivor: "No, it got nerfed didn't you hear, it must be useless now. DS never helped with tunneling anyway."
I don't understand. I guess they really wanted to keep that DS abuse going? DS is still strong if they tunnel and still acts as a tunnel deterrent. But none of that matters if no one is using it.
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Are you aware that you can heal while in a chase? If you juke the killer, and he is searching for you, yes, he tunnels you, yet you could use the time to partially heal.
But lets say you are right with this points. Then i still have some questions and possibly tweekss:
Why should the perk has a limitet time frame? The argument to deactivate it is you progress the game. Why deactivate it while you are being tunneled just because the killer needs some time to down you again?
Limited uses: If it is to hinder tunneling, why does it only work ones? Should it not work every time you are unhooked until you do something to progress the game?
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My dude is spitting right facts here.
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Some people suggested in this post and others that they do think this change is healthy and goes in the right direction, but DS needs to activate twice in order to really discourage tunnelling.
That's I think a change I'd accept as main killer, since It wouldn't affect my gameplay unless I do tunnel, and the perk would deactivate anyways if the game progresses.
Still, even if I'd accept it, I'm not so sure if this change would be 100% healthy. There could be end-game scenarios where the possibility of getting hit twice by DS would be extremely oppressive to a killer that usually never tunnels.
This is a possibility, and actually would have the contrary effect: The killer would be forced to tunnel in order to use up their DS "tokens".
Hence, I think the current state of DS is the healthiest possible, but time will tell us if we are wrong or not.
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I agree with both, since we fixed the main problem with Decisive Strike, why not make it stronger at what it does? To add on, beginners won't have to worry about a difficult skill check since it's automatic.
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It's not useless, it's just that bad players can't be carried by it anymore.
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